Water skiing is gaining in popularity at a tremendous pace, but insofar as is known to the applicant, no satisfactory boat attachment is available to assist in the education and training of persons in the art of water skiiing, either in elementary form or to raise the skill level of a person beyond the elementary form.
The prior art known to applicant consists of a bar or boom connected rigidly to the boat in position crosswise thereof. A skier holding on to a rigid boom always gets a lift therefrom and therefore has difficulty in establishing a feel of the water on his or her own.
Rigid booms also restrict the boat from passageways where the sides are closer together than the length of the boom. The rigid boom cannot be used on small bodies of water where the boat must be tightly turned and therefore highly banked, since the skier holding on to the boom is either yanked from the water or is dunked under the water surface, depending upon the side of the boat the skier is on during the turn made by the boat operator.
Apart from the rigid boom, the only other ski appatatus known to applicant is the familiar tow from the back of the boat. This type of tow is used in ski meets by experienced skiers. The inexperienced have great difficulty in learning to ski by being towed from the back of the boat because of wake produced by a speeding boat. This type of skiing can also be dangerous for the inexperienced skier since the boat propeller is at the stern of the boat and in case of a tow rope foulup, the skier may be hit by the propeller.
My invention makes it possible for a person to ski a short distance from the side of the boat and therefore be free of most of the wake. In carrying out my invention, an elongated bar is pivotally mounted at the boat side about a horizontally-disposed pivot so that the free end of the bar may move in a vertical direction. The bar is braced to withstand the pull of the skier but the bracing does not prevent vertical movement of the free end of the bar.
The beginning skier may be taught by a coach in the boat and since the skier is at the side of the boat, questions and instructions may be given at close quarters. Further, movies and photographs may be taken by the coach, or any other person, for instructional or other purposes.
Since the bar is permitted to swing vertically, the skier may place less and less reliance on the bar, as he or she gains confidence and experience and, after sufficient training, the skier is ready to enter meets where skiing is done by tow at the rear of the boat.